


This Business with Hearts

by canolacrush



Series: Intermezzo [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Emotions, Emotions everywhere, Episode: s03e03 His Last Vow, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, Hospitals, Missing Scene, depends on how you read the lines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-21
Updated: 2014-01-21
Packaged: 2018-01-09 14:16:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1146954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/canolacrush/pseuds/canolacrush
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anything could upset a heart.  The wrong dose of medication, too much cholesterol, a bullet, betrayal, the look of someone you fancy—it takes very little to upset a heart.</p>
<p>Caution: contains spoilers for "His Last Vow"</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Business with Hearts

**Author's Note:**

> Because when I finally put my finger on what was missing from that episode in order for it to feel "whole" to me, I had to write it. Short n' sweet, but that's really all I needed.
> 
> Thanks goes to my beta Shaindy, for always making sure I've got the perfect words in the perfect place. ;-)

Sherlock wakes up once again in hospital, attached once more to a morphine drip.  He’d been right about his heart needing to be started again.  It was a bit of problem these days, this business with hearts.  They weren’t very reliable organs.  Now, livers—livers could be counted on.  If you took care of a liver, it did its job; if you cut off a chunk of it, it grows back.  But hearts, no.  Anything could upset a heart.  The wrong dose of medication, too much cholesterol, a bullet, betrayal, the look of someone you fancy—it takes very little to upset a heart.

 

It feels like a fist-sized bruise trapped between his ribs, throttled and squeezed too many times.  He’s tired.  There’s a stabbing pain in his abdomen and he cringes, automatically reaching to the drip control and upping the dosage.

 

He hears the soft scrape of a chair and looks over to find John sitting next to him, quietly looking frayed to the ends of his endurance.

 

“You’re awake,” John says.

 

Sherlock squints at him, briefly scans the room.  It’s evening, late.  Visiting hours are over.  “Where’s Mary?” he asks, rasping.

 

John’s jaw clenches and his gaze turns hard; he takes a quick, deep breath.  “I sent her home,” John replies.

 

“And you’re not—?”

 

“No,” John answers, before Sherlock has the chance to ask ‘with her?’

 

Sherlock breathes and rests his head back on the pillow, still exhausted, still in pain.  He hears John sigh and scuffle the chair closer.  They say nothing.  Sherlock contemplates falling asleep again.

 

Instead, he says, “Visiting hours are over, John.”

 

“Yeah, I know,” John replies.  “Lucky for me, though, I have some colleagues here.  Not hard to convince them.”

 

Sherlock hums a noise of acknowledgement.  He’s nearly asleep again when he feels John’s hand cover and squeeze his own.  He blinks, fighting to keep himself awake through the haze of soporific pain meds, and looks over.

 

John’s holding on so tight it almost hurts, but he’s looking away, nowhere near Sherlock at all.  He’s taking a few deep breaths and blinking a lot.

 

Sherlock frowns at him.  “Jo—”

 

“Twice,” John says, almost a whisper.  He sucks in a breath, exhales shakily, and struggles to continue in that whispery, wretched voice, “You’ve died on me, Sherlock.  Twice.”

 

Sherlock’s starting to lose feeling in his fingers.  “Only once,” he murmurs back.

 

“ _Twice_ ,” John hisses, turning his gaze sharply back on Sherlock.  His eyes are wet, but he’s manfully restraining tears from falling.  “ _And don’t you bloody well correct me, Sherlock, not today,_ ” he says, oddly hushed, voice cracking slightly at the end.  He breathes again, closing his eyes to get control over himself.  “Not now.  Not with…everything.  Not now.”

 

“Okay,” Sherlock whispers back.  He glances down at their hands.  “Perhaps you could…loosen up a bit?”

 

“ _Don’t you bloody_ —”

 

“Hands.”

 

John blinks and breathes heavily, shoulders rising and falling, then registers what Sherlock has said.  He lets go of his hand entirely.  “Sorry,” he murmurs.

 

“It’s fine,” Sherlock mumbles, stretching out his fingers to encourage the blood flow to return.  “It’s fine,” he adds again.  Then, after a beat of silence wherein John again does not look at him, Sherlock says, “I’m sorry.”

 

John looks over, incredulous.  “You?  _You’re_ sorry?” he says, voice rising.  “ _You’re_ not the one who should be sorry, Sherlock, my bloody lying wife should be the one begging for forgiveness for putting you in a bleeding hospital bed and—”

 

“ _John_ ,” Sherlock hoarse-whispers at him.  “You’re in a hospital.  Calm down.”

 

“ _Calm down?_ ” John shouts, then takes another breath.  He shakes his head then rubs his hands over his face, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees.  “Jesus Christ,” he mutters.  “What have I married?”

 

“A remarkable woman,” Sherlock answers, earning him a sudden glare from John.  Sherlock closes his eyes and rests back against the bed.  “I mean it, John.  There are very few women like her.  You’ve chosen a remarkable companion for yourself.”

 

John makes a sound that’s almost a laugh.  “Christ, the two of you really _should_ have gotten married.”

 

Sherlock quirks a tiny smile.  “Mm, no,” he answers with a sigh.  “Women, John.  Not my area.”

 

“Could’ve fooled me,” John says, and it sounds so caustically sharp that Sherlock has to open his eyes again, fighting the desire to sleep.  He sends John a baffled look.  “Janine,” John prompts.

 

“That was for a case, John, you know that,” Sherlock replies.

 

“Yeah, well, you were very convincing,” John retorts.

 

Sherlock snorts, then cringes and decides it’s better not to do that.  “It’s not hard to be convincing,” he manages.  He sighs and closes his eyes, concentrating for a moment on the sore ache in his chest and the sharp pangs from the open bullet wound in his abdomen.  “You should…go.  People might…something.”

 

“Talk?  They’re already doing enough of that, Shag-A-Lot Holmes, they don’t need me for that,” John says, then sighs.  “And I don’t really feel like going home.”

 

Sherlock feels the light, warm touch of John’s hand return.  He desperately wants to sleep, but his heart has flopped.  Experience tells him that’s not good, heart-flopping.  He’s injured.  He should rest.  Recover.  His mind is slipping.  Yet at the last second, he manages to offer, “There’s always…Baker Street.”

 

John squeezes his hand.  “I’ll be there,” he whispers, and Sherlock Holmes drifts away with a smile on his lips.


End file.
